Oh, those 'radicals'!

Today the HarperCons stepped into the [cesspool / polluted waters] tar sands issue to announce a water monitoring project which will take 3 years and $50 million to fully implement. The Regina Mom agrees with Halifax NDP MP Megan Leslie; this is a PR stunt. And, TRM shares Edmonton MP Linda Duncan's concerns that First Nations communities were not adequately consulted and that many more tar sands projects could be approved before this monitoring begins. TRM considers this announcement to be a reflection of the great work the ecojustice community "radical groups" are doing to educate citizens on the issues. Well done, radicals!

One such radical, Andrew Nikiforuk, declared a political emergency regarding the tar sands years ago. His latest piece at The Tyee cites a "detailed analysis" submitted to the National Energy Board by Robyn Allan who is the former president and CEO of the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia. Ms. Allan's report "concludes that "Northern Gateway is neither needed nor is in the public interest."

"I assumed that it would be a wealth generating project," the 56-year-old retired investment and financial affairs economist told the Tyee. "But when I started digging none of those assumptions held. The project is an inflationary price shock to the economy."

...

Allan, once rated by the National Post as one of Canada's top 200 CEOs, says she started to study the economic case for the project after a query by her son. That was when she discovered that Enbridge's economic benefit models were based on "misleading information, faulty methodology, numerous errors and presentation bias."

TRM's readers can download Allan's full report, "An Economic Assessment of Northern Gateway" at the Alberta Federation of Labour's website. Note that, according to Nikiforuk, "Allan's report supports the findings of Dave Hughes, a retired senior analyst with Natural Resources Canada. He described the pipeline as a risk to Canada's economic and energy security" a report to which TRM has previously linked.

Further commentary comes from the Communications, Energy, and Paperworkers Union of Canada which also says that the Gateway pipeline is unsustainable, based on a report they commissioned from Informetrica Inc.